Just when I was getting used to the idea that every DC Animated Universe release was going to be a continuation of the New 52 paradigm, they throw us a curveball and give us another chapter in JUSTICE LEAGUE UNLIMITED -- and a most welcome one at that!

The voice acting trinity of Kevin Conroy, Susan Eisenberg, and George Newbern return as Batman, Wonder Woman, and Superman, with Kevin Michael Richardson joining the team as Mr. Terrific and Daniela Bobadilla as potential League recruit, Miss Martian.

This one is on us, dear readers. We've been so busy catching up with our office relocations, that we barely noticed the month had changed. So here we are, ankle deep into a new month, and only now getting around to presenting you with this month's cosplayer.

So we beg your forgiveness and indulgences, and hope you'll all agree it was worth the wait for our newest member to the Critical Blast Bombshell club. Now wait no more, and proceed on to meet our...

Critical Blast Bombshell, April 2019

KRONICkaren

For the first fifteen minutes of BUMBLEBEE, I found myself over-analyzing things. The battle for Cybertron, for instance, was fought between Autobots and Decepticons who transformed themselves into vehicles already. Why? They did not have vehicles there to blend in with, they traveled under their own power, they had programming (in English) that had to have been put in by somebody, and, most distracting, their "mouths" moved when they spoke when their voices were sent through speakers, so there was no reason to use movement to articulate sounds. In fact, being advanced electronics, it was more likely they would communicate directly, wirelessly, through technology akin to Bluetooth.

And then I got it. It wasn't that BUMBLEBEE was cheesy like an 80s movie. It's not that BUMBLEBEE was even an homage to cheesy 80s movies.

Before I say “I told you so!” because I did, let’s recap: Marvel makes awesome superhero movies. Dc makes duds. They did manage to make Wonder Woman and Aquaman entertaining, but Batman vs. Superman, Justice League, Suicide Squad, and Green Lantern – which was so bad that it’s star lampooned himself for it in a much more successful Marvel flick – were not even on par with the least of the Marvel Cinematic Universe. That would be Iron Man III, in my opinion, though Thor II wasn’t great and….well, can we count Blade III part of the MCU? Nah. It’s been such a dismally lopsided contest that DC recently threw in the towel and declared the “shared universe” for DC films dead. They’re not going to try to be Marvel. They’re just going to try to make good movies again.

Carolyn Keene's girl detective is getting another shot at live action adaptation, this time coming to the screen with the help of IT girl, SOPHIA LILLIS as the titular Nancy Drew.

Nancy lives in a small town, having moved there from Chicago with her father, attorney Carson Drew (TRUE BLOOD's SAM TRAMMELL), following the death of her mother. She's a tomboy with a penchant for getting into trouble due to her sense of vigilante justice (which ranges from dying a bully blue to actual breaking and entering).

Despite her short time in town, she's made some friends in plucky George Fayne (ZOE RENEE) and scientific genius Bess Marvin (MACKENZIE GRAHAM). She's also made an enemy in rich girl Helen Corning (LAURA WIGGINS), the girlfriend of said bully-turned-blue.

Waitress, the musical, premiered on Broadway eight years after the film on which it is based debuted at the Sundance Film Festival, which itself was three months after the shocking death of writer and director Adrienne Shelly. The film was a hit, starring Keri Russell as a beat-down pie slinger in an abusive relationship. Her costars included Nathan Fillion as her new hunky OB/GYN and Andy Griffith as the cantankerous owner of Joe’s Pie Diner. In 2016, the film was adapted on Broadway and the U.S. Tour has arrived at the Fabulous Fox Theatre for a two-week engagement, March 26 – April 7, 2019.

Little Rock, AR, 4/1/2019— Cirsova Publishing has teamed up with StarTwo to create an all-new, fully illustrated 70^th Anniversary Edition of Leigh Brackett’s original Eric John Stark Trilogy. Cirsova Publishing aims to bring the action, adventure and romance of Leigh Brackett to a new generation of readers.

First published in the Summer of 1949, Queen of the Martian Catacombs introduced the world to Eric John Stark, the black mercenary swordsman. Stark’s adventures continued on Venus in 1949’s The Enchantress of Venus, and the swordsman returned to the Red Planet in 1951’s Black Amazon of Mars. While Brackett would revisit the character in 1970s with the Skaith trilogy, the original novellas are significant as one of the last iconic Sword & Planet cycles of the pulp era.

The bad boy of musical theatre, St. Louis' New Line Theatre doesn't shy away from edgy material. They also perform musical classics, uncovering the fundamental truth of a given production that sometimes gets buried after years of revivals and reinterpretations. 

Our apologies, dear readers, for the glacial pacing of our announcements for the 2018 Best Of awards. Our focus has been on our relocation efforts, and sadly some of our other duties have suffered in the wake of that. But the show, as they say, must go on, and so we find ourselves announcing the Best novel of 2018.

The year saw some really good books come out, and it was very difficult to narrow down even a list of nominees, let alone select a very best of the selection -- especially with titles like CLOD MAKES A FRIEND by David Pedersen, WRATH OF THE DRAGON KING by Brandon Mull, and THE FANDOM by Anna Day. 

However, by a splinter of the vote, the award goes to Charles Soule for his first novel, THE ORACLE YEAR, about a young man who wakes up one morning with the ability to predict the future with 100% accuracy.

When the Marvel Cinematic Universe was being birthed, there were labor pains. How could they have a successful franchise, when their top selling titles -- Spider-Man, Fantastic Four, and X-Men -- were already franchised out to other production houses?

It's hard to imagine it now (and for longtime comic boom fans, it was even hard to imagine it then), but at the time all this was going down, Iron Man, Hulk and Captain America were not top-tier characters for the House of Ideas. There was literally nowhere to go but up with these guys, and so that's where they went.

ROB MARSHALL has accomplished the rare privilege of getting to direct a classic of the Disney variety. MARY POPPINS RETURNS pops off the screen, with a color palette right out of a fantasy and a soundtrack firmly in tune with the songs from the original 1964 film that gave us such unforgettable songs as "Chim Chim Cher-ee" and "Supercalifragilisticexpialidocious."

EMILY BLUNT steps into the impeccable shoes of the unflappable Mary Poppins, arriving at a time when the two Banks children, Michael (BEN WHISHAW) and Jane (EMILY MORTIMER) have grown up. Jane, like her mother, works to promote women's suffrage, while Michael is a struggling artist who has taken a job at the bank to make ends meet after the loss of his wife. Michael's three children, John, Annabel, and Georgie, do their best to help out, but can accomplish very little when the family learns they have until the end of the week to come up with the money to save their family home before the bank forecloses on it.

Stain’s real name is Princess Lyra.  She is the only daughter of King Kiran and Queen Arael; however, Queen Arael dies during child-birth.  King Kiran adores his daughter and is willing to do anything for her.  King Kiran has a despicable sister named Lady Griselda who has three daughters.

Johnny Cash was a legend in country music and pop culture. His deep baritone voice grabbed the listener’s attention like a fire and brimstone preacher. He sang romantic ballads, colorful yarns about life on the road, somber ditties of crime and punishment, and witty tunes about life’s oddities, such as the strange names peculiar parents sometimes saddle upon their children.

Carole Klein was born in Brooklyn, New York, just a couple of months after the bombing of Pearl Harbor. She grew up playing the piano with her parents, who could tell at an early age that she was gifted with perfect pitch. By the time she reached high school, Carole changed her name to King and began writing songs with a friend from the neighborhood, a kid by the name of Paul Simon. You might have heard of him--he did all right. Carole was only sixteen when she entered Queens College. She was going to be a teacher, but yearned to make songs that would make listeners feel the amazement and joy that she felt listening to the hits of the era over the family radio. She soon broke into the music business in 1958 with “The Right Girl.”  Carole King could write the music, but her lyrics needed work. Enter a young man named Gerry Goffin, a drama major who had a knack for words.

Finally, a giveaway that's practically perfect in every  way!

Up for grabs this time, Critical Blast is proud to offer the Blu-ray combo pack of Walt Disney's MARY POPPINS RETURNS, starring EMILY BLUNT as the iconic magical nanny, and LIN-MANUEL MIRANDA as her streetwise friend, Jack. Returning to the Banks' home during a time of crisis, Mary Poppins arrives just in time to save the Banks children -- and their children -- as well as their family home.

Replete with all the 2D animation mixed with live action footage, and filled from beginning to end with song and enchantment, MARY POPPINS RETURNS is a supercalifragilisticexpialidocious addition to any family's video library.

And to sweeten the deal, this package comes with a compact mirror with digital messaging! Let's see Mary Poppins top that!

The current season of Supergirl has gotten so political, it has become difficult to watch. But the most recent sin was so bad that I can honestly say that other than character names, this isn't a show about Supergirl.

Pitting Aliens against Earthlings in some political parallel with today's issues that face America is stomach turning to say the least. The show spent the first couple of seasons introducing alien threats so menacing, the plot centered around Supergirl's coordinated work with the DEO. A department specifically designed to police the activity of aliens.

Let's restate that, shall we?

Supergirl established a plot where aliens are considered threats. Threats that are so big, an entire organization was needed to police their activities.

(Article Image: "Roulette" (CC BY 2.0) by Sonny Side Up!)

Roulette is one of the most famous and iconic casino games on the planet, and even people uninterested in staking money on things are familiar with the table game. Ever since the spinning wheel was invented by Blaise Pascal way back in 18th century France, people have been trying to work out ways to beat it and fix the result so that they can win money. But no matter what the cunning tricksters try, it’s usually the game and the house which prevail. So what are the methods that have been used? Are any actually viable?

If you are a comics fan who goes to your local shop, checks the shelves for new items, spends a few minutes in the back issue boxes, and goes home to enjoy your purchase, you live in the best of all possible worlds.

If you have a social media account, you've shattered that utopia, and have likely been told to pick a side in the ongoing culture wars -- or been forced into a side whether you chose or not. It's called ComicsGate, 

In much the same way an irritant in an oyster causes the generation of a pearl, the mainstream comic industry and the creators who  have aligned with ComicsGate have worked together -- reluctantly, unwittingly, unknowingly, anything but admittedly -- to create some gems (and some malformations) through the crowdfunding platforms that have financed their own comics, several of them to the tune of six-figures.

One of the things that makes Apex: Legends so unique is their voice talent.

If you're even slightly aware of anime and have a social media account, you've no doubt seen the hashtags #KickVic, #IStandWithVic, and #VicKicksBack. The hashtag battles refer to the allegations against popular voice actor, Vic Mignogna, whose work is front-and-center in the recent release, DRAGON BALL SUPER: BROLY, as well as a former regular on the anime series, RWBY.